Thermaltake Tsunami: A Complete Visual Overhaul
by Purav Sanghani on September 10, 2004 12:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
Cooling
Thermaltake has always been known for its inclusion of case fans in all of their cases. Each case comes standard with at least four 80mm fans, which are more than enough to cool an Athlon 64 3200+ system. The Tsunami comes with dual 120mm fans located at the front (12025) and back (LED fan), and a 90mm fan (9025) located on the left side panel.The 120mm fan at the front is located directly in front of the removable HDD carriage to serve as an intake fan. It blows air directly at and in between the HDDs, no matter how many are installed.
Click to enlarge.
The second 120mm fan is located at the back of the case below the power supply mounting. This fan is a blue colored LED fan, which matches the lights on the door that we talked about earlier.
Click to enlarge.
Though these two fans alone combined with a good quality heatsink could keep temperatures of the highest end desktop system stable, Thermaltake has decided to add a third 90mm fan in the mix on the left side panel. This fan serves as an intake and is positioned over the CPU area of the motherboard. Thermaltake should have placed this fan lower to accommodate the area around the VGA card instead of where it is now, since it only works against the heatsink fan.
Click to enlarge.
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JohnnyCNote - Friday, September 10, 2004 - link
JarredWalton - Friday, September 10, 2004 - link
#2 echoes my thoughts, except there is one major difference from the SLK3700-BQE: the hard drive cage is rotated on the Antec.If that is truly the case (ow - bad pun!), then I can almost certainly vouch for the difficulty of putting a PSU into such a case after the other components are installed. My Antec PSU started having fan issues, so I replaced it with a Thermaltake Polo12. With a Zalman CNPS7000a heatsink on the motherboard, it was almost impossible to get the PSU into position without removing the motherboard. I eventually succeeded after taking out all the CD/DVD drives, but I think if I have to do it again, I'll just save myself the trouble and removed the motherboard. Which is really not saving much trouble. :(
So, install your PSU first in these cases, and pray to whatever gods you hold dear that your PSU doesn't die before you're ready to upgrade the system. ;)
Other than that, it's a nice looking case, other than the orange fan on the window.
LocutusX - Friday, September 10, 2004 - link
To article author:Please address the points raised by me in #3 and the other person in #8. Thanks!
(IMO, swapping PSUs seems to be pretty frequent nowadays among enthusiasts - almost as frequent as swapping mobos, in fact)
GhandiInstinct - Friday, September 10, 2004 - link
So let me get this right, I'll have to install my PSU before my motherboard? And I'll have to remove the top audio/fw/usb?Also, I didn't see anything said about the filter in the front of the case, on the 120mm.
Happy Buddha - Friday, September 10, 2004 - link
NIce review. There is still something I'd like to be add on the thermal and sound benchmark; since I am(and sureley other) interest in buying this case with the non-window version wich do not have the 90mm side fan, I't would be nice if you could redo these Bencmark with the side fan off + completly plug the hole. This way it would make a fair comparison of the two version available for this case. Thanks.whitelight - Friday, September 10, 2004 - link
#5 - it won't work against the CPU fan. if you have a side intake fan, you can duct cold air directly onto the cpu. and you obviously shouldn't use the CPU fan to suck air from the heatsink, rather using the CPU fan to blow air onto the heatsink.jkostans - Friday, September 10, 2004 - link
If the Side fan is an intake, how does it work against the CPU fan? I've never seen a CPU fan move air any direction but through the heatsink towards the motherboard. Maybe I'm wrong.....ciwell - Friday, September 10, 2004 - link
FINALLY! Thanks for the review I have been waiting for. ::thumbs up::LocutusX - Friday, September 10, 2004 - link
The problem I had with my Tsunami was that I couldn't figure out how to open the top cover, making it quite difficult to swap PSU's - I guess that relates to the whole "front audio/USB pod" thing, and because they put that there, they had to permanently nail down the top cover?That's too bad, it means you'll probably have to remove the motherboard whenever you swap PSU's.
themelon - Friday, September 10, 2004 - link
Its almost identicle on the inside to the Antec SLK3700. Same 5 and 2 bay drive cage, same fan placement. The only major difference I see is the flip up clips for the expansion card mounting.